


Of Query and Frustration

by wearethewitches



Category: NCIS
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Background Case, Canon-Typical Violence, Children of Characters, Developing Relationship, Episode Related, F/M, Family Drama, Feminist Themes, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Non-Explicit Sex, One Word Prompts, POV Alternating, Past Character Death, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Relationship(s), Period-Typical Sexism, Prompt Fic, Women in the Military
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-06 03:01:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 9,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21219482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wearethewitches/pseuds/wearethewitches
Summary: Ah, there it is. The classic Jethro look of query and frustration, mixed with a dash of “Someone is gonna pay for this.”- Ducky, S14E19.or, Caitlin Todd has a secret nearly a decade old and Gibbs' efforts to get over his fast-blooming crush are going badly.But it doesn't really matter in the end, because this is a Kibbs fanfiction and I aminvested. I love these guys.[ 23 prompts = 23 episodes + ad. prompts & part 2s ] KIBBS





	1. Mine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Yankee White" - NCIS S01E01

Their descent to Andrews is quiet, but Gibbs is having a chuckle to himself, in the quiet of his head. Agent Todd is ballsy, bright-eyed and presumably, destined to be spitting mad at him for the switch he’s about to pull with the body. She sits right in front of him, looking off to the side, her legs crossed and her hands grasping the arms of her chair.

_Seems pretty comfortable with flying,_ he notes, idly – terribly and lewdly – wondering what it’d be like to get his hands down her Secret Service dress pants. It’s a bit late to join the Mile High Club, but Gibbs’ imagination can run wild when he lets it.

When he says _please_ to her in Navy Yard, it is in mockery of pleading from a daydream.

But the work goes on – the case gets tighter. Gibbs locks down on his daydreaming and starts up his inner bloodhound, though the scent of this murder has gone cold to him. The Secret Service, NCIS and the FBI all work together, trying to figure out a plan that is surely brought on by Al Qaeda. When Gibbs hears of Major Kerry’s death, there’s a short anger in his gut, a thought of whether the only connection – Kate Todd herself – is a traitor making him snarl inside.

_And I liked her,_ he thinks morosely, angrily, up until he locks her in a bathroom with him and asks her. Kate’s reaction is proof, blood rushing from her face and making her look even more ill than yesterday. _Liars can’t pale on cue, _he thinks, grimly keeping his countenance

The way she reacted was the only way she could – crying and hitting at him, pressing up against his taller form in protest. Gibbs won’t lie and say he was aroused: he couldn’t be, not then. There’s never anything to admire from fresh grief. Kate Todd is already _Kate_ in his head by then. She’s a woman and he can be a misogynist bastard of his time, for all it gets him by admitting it. He knows Abby better by her first name than he does Tony – though in truth, there’s other angles to look at there, their partnership in the field included. Last names are a given, amongst teammates.

Kate is Secret Service.

And then she isn’t.

For the Secret Service, Gibbs thinks it’s a waste, but considering how it frees up her time so she might work at _NCIS_…Gibbs thinks he’s getting the better offer. But resigning just because she screwed a co-worker that, in her own words, was around her twenty-four seven is not on the table. She kept her relationship professional and secret for months, right under the noses of her colleagues, who are meant to be able to sniff this kind of stuff from the get-go; and when she told the truth, she resigned. She _resigned_.

Gibbs tells her the truth, then.

If she pulls that crap at NCIS, he won’t give her a chance to resign before he fires her himself – but he doesn’t mean the relationship.


	2. Whole

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Hung Out to Dry" - NCIS S01E02

Two weeks later – after a funeral she didn’t feel like she deserved to be attending, after a call from her eldest brother reminding her that it’s _his_ ninth birthday, after two bottles of wine, an application form and an interview with the NCIS HR Department – Kate trudges onto a muddy field in the middle of the night and is handed a pair of gloves. The following boots are a nice touch, but it’s the hat that really gets her.

She has a hat. That has always meant that she’s officially on the team. The softball leagues in Kate’s hometown handed out hats to regular players and let the reserves buy them with their pocket change; and Gibbs has just given her a hat and welcomed her to NCIS, like the last misadventure they’d had wasn’t their first _hello_, but instead an audition that she passed without knowing.

Dinozzo takes a picture of her.

“Thanks, Dinozzo,” she says sarcastically, like she isn’t questioning his professionalism when they’re mere feet away from a deceased Marine.

Dinozzo grins at her in a fashion that might be charming to another breed of woman, then replies.

“Hey, you could be the NCIS poster-girl in that outfit.”

It won’t be until the case is finished and they’re in the office, quietly writing up their reports, that Kate will catch him sticking a print-out in a thick book, scribbling her name underneath. When he catches her looking, Dinozzo winks.

“Got to keep track of my memories. The ol’ noggin won’t stay crystal clear forever – just ask Gibbs!”

“My mind is a steel trap,” Gibbs says without pause, concentrating on his reports. “I don’t forget.”

“Boss,” Dinozzo straightens, cocky and playful as he replies. “Come on. You got to admit, photos are a decent way to preserve our _treasured_ _memories_.”

“I have photos, Dinozzo,” their boss puts in, actually looking up at him this time. Kate leans in, eager to hear what he has to say. “I just don’t parade them for everyone to see.”

“I don’t _parade_ around my photo albums, boss.”

“You aren’t subtle about it when you’re sticking new ones in, though,” Gibbs answers Dinozzo’s whining. To Kate, the bickering sounds normal – her idea only enforced by Dinozzo’s pout and subsequent return to silence.

She wonders how their partnership functions, if she is intruding or if she is a replacement. Who was the Probationary Agent before her? Do they have a secretary? They have an Abby and a Ducky, she knows – but Kate wonders what role she is taking, here.

Gibbs is the team leader. Clearly. Kate is impressed by his work ethic, but somehow unsurprised. Perhaps his time on Airforce One and Alpha Foxtrot 2900 could have been mistaken as a fluke – but with the investigation into Sergeant Fuentes’ death, that can’t be the case. Gibbs has rules and he has a gut that churns at less than a whisper of something fishy. Where Dinozzo is still running around taking orders and making mistakes, Gibbs has investigating down to an art.

Kate also has to admit, the silver fox look, despite his departure from the _young male_ category, is tempting. Once upon a time, he wouldn’t have been her type in the least, but then again, Kate of a year ago wouldn’t have been charmed by a man in uniform. Like Major Kerry, he’s had Marine training – an overview of his file before her resignation from the Secret Service to get him on the backup Air Force One told her much about his military career.

Unaware she’s staring at him, Kate only returns to her report when he looks in her direction, lip curling as he raises an eyebrow. Embarrassed by her own actions, Kate makes a private pledge not to make the same mistake she made in the Secret Service. It would be even worse if she caught feelings, like she clearly had towards the end of her affair with Tim Kerry.

_Damn,_ Kate swears to herself, pinching the bridge of her nose. The pain distracts her from the unanticipated bought of tears wanting to prickle in her eyes, at the reminder that her boyfriend is dead. _Boyfriend – how juvenile. I didn’t even love him. I only liked him; and now, he’s dead. Gone._ Her grief is not a vice in her chest, but neither is it fading as fast as she’d like.

Kate’s heart is whole. That doesn’t mean it is not still bruised.

She returns to her paperwork and hopes, fleetingly, that she doesn’t get another crush on a co-worker for a long, long time.


	3. Hill

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Seadog" - NCIS S01E03

Kate says stuff a lot that only concerns him in the moment. Like her backwards joke about Tony using the lecture on harassment to learn how to do just that, or her reply to Tony’s very next line about finding his seatbelt. Gibbs’ brain goes places it shouldn’t – thoughts like _not Tony’s place_ and _I wish that were me _rushing through his mind – and then he cranks it back.

Agent Todd is his subordinate. Maybe Tony _should_ be attending the lecture.

Then she’s getting hazed and actually asking whether it’s because she’s new or she’s female. It _is_ because she’s new, but the way she approaches the topic itself, disregarding Tony’s line about sexism...Gibbs heads that conversation off, but strangely, her words linger. He’s heard some angry defences against sexist behaviour in the past and Kate’s? Well, Kate’s doesn’t fit.

Maybe he’s being paranoid. Getting to where she was in the Secret Service was one hell of a hill to climb and Gibbs wouldn’t blame her for getting used to bullshit. Now she’s out, in the bowels of a new agency, she’s testing the boundaries – and that includes the feminist values of NCIS.

Gibbs scowls at his Bourbon for that word. He was happier not knowing how _the Patriarchy_ is suppressing women, before Diane came around with her suffragette nonsense. Now it all just sticks in his head like with Kate, here and now, at the most god-awful moments. Gibbs wants a refund. Or therapy.

Truthfully – _just to himself_ – Gibbs likes the idea that women can do more. His mother did a heap of charity work before her death and she could have been great at anything in life, if only she had the option. He remembers her enthusiasm when that one letter came, inviting him to art classes over the summer for carpentry when he was ten. She was so happy, up until his father scolded her for thinking their Leroy would ever get anything but a shitty life as an artist.

Gibbs thinks- no, he _knows_ his mother would have liked Diane’s values, even if they split, in the end. In the end, he’d joined the Marines and he’d given up wondering what his mother would have thought about everything…everything except Shannon and Kelly, that is. She knew Shannon. She liked her – and she would have adored Kelly, her first and only grandchild by blood.

_Oh Jesus_, Gibbs gulps down his Bourbon, knowing he’s past tipsy at this point. _We’re really going there, tonight._

He works on his boat, but his thoughts are with his mother. Yes, she would have liked Shannon and Kelly – but she would also have liked Diane, too and she would have liked Rebecca and _loved _her step-grandsons, up until Rebecca cheated. Gibbs knows his mother would have turned from loving mama bear to a curse-slinging witch of a woman in an instant – though whether she’d keep in contact with Ryan and Deacon is another matter entirely, one Gibbs doesn’t want to think about. Ever. Mainly, due to the fact that Rebecca didn’t let him see them at all, after they moved out. He was even blacklisted from their school, for Christ’s sake.

Gibbs would be to blame for the break-up with Stephanie in his mother’s mind, for sure and the two women might even have kept in contact afterwards, until his mother had enough. Her calls every year are migraine-inducing and Gibbs had had enough of it years ago.

_What would she have thought about Kate?_ His drunk mind wanders from his ex-wives to his new agent. Work on the boat slows to a halt and for a minute, he actually lets his imagination spill to life, his mother’s smile turning red from bleached-out white and Kate’s smile reflecting back in his eyes.

His mother would have loved Kate. She also would have slapped Gibbs one upside the head for cradle-snatching and told him off in private, before inviting Kate to the family.

How had he gotten from sexism to his mother? Gibbs has to shake his head, tidying up the basement for the evening and belatedly remembering that it was paranoia. Kate had worried him, her reaction to everything far from put-on, but also far from what he almost _wants_ to have witnessed. Tony is one of the genuinely harmless cads out there, meaningful actions driven by firm ethics and strong morals – and Kate seems to see that, slowly digging past his top layer that can only be described as _skirt-chasing frat-boy_, to realise he’s a great detective and that he does his job well.

Kate would probably like it better if Tony didn’t flirt with every female in a hundred mile radius, but Gibbs’ job is an investigator, not a baby-sitter. Dinozzo has had enough battles with HR in the police department that he knows not to press too far; if he pisses Kate off enough that she reports him, that’s his own problem.

Tired and a little dizzy, Gibbs trudges to bed, briefly imagining what it would be like to wake up next to his subordinate. Maybe Kate would tell him off – maybe she’d be scared. It turns his mind sour. Gibbs doesn’t want her to be scared of him, he wants her to _trust_ him.

Drunkenly, Gibbs makes a rule, just for himself and himself alone – no matter how much he wants to extend that to everyone in NCIS. It’s his last thought as he falls into slumber.

_No falling in love with Kate Todd allowed._


	4. Mark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "The Immortals" - S01E04

Once upon a time, Kate knew a man by the name of Mark Friedman. He slept in the same dorm as her brother, Andrew Todd Jr., in college and then the same corridor at their hotel, on spring break. He was chauvinistic and leered at her incessantly on the road-trip between Indianapolis and Penn. State U. Even Andy was taken aback by his behaviour and after…well, after _the Incident_, Andy never spoke to him again.

Mark Friedman was not a Marine, but he _was_ in the Forces, for all that he never left boot-camp.

His death was a surprise to many. When Andy got the news that his death was ruled as suicide, he was inordinately pleased and didn’t bother to hide it – alarming the Todd family and most certainly, their mother. Olivia Todd had Andy _exorcised_ for laughing as hard as he did.

In the wake of Seaman MacDonald’s maddened, fatal trip across the ocean floor, Kate looks up his records and requests access before their case is officially closed, ‘to compare’. Unsurprisingly, Mark Friedman was given a post-humous dishonourable discharge and stripped of his military rank, however low it was, for his supposed suicide. When she reads ‘supposed’ however, Kate immediately looks further into it.

_‘Friedman was discovered hanging in the male heads of the main building (Building 1A, Block 6) from a rafter, with severe bruising and lacerations gained during an assault of some kind. Interviews with his bunkmates revealed the bruising and lacerations were from Friedman’s social activities during downtime and his assailants were unknown to any of the men. Note: uniform story from each recruit, without deviation or elaboration.’_

Swallowing a hard lump in her throat, Kate looks at the photographs taken. There is a familiar sadness in her gut at the sight of a dead soldier, but it’s smothered by a helpless rage. Kate shuffles the photos, looking at each in turn from a different angle, bringing the clearest to her desk-light to see better.

He hangs there, from his own bedsheet. How he’d get that out of the barracks into a heads in their main offices is a conundrum Kate can solve without much thought. Even from what little information she’s read, she can tell that his bunkmates had something to do with his murder; but the thought of her mother in church praying for her brother’s soul, not even _hinting_ at spiritual reparations for Mark Friedman, makes Kate think it horribly right, after what he did in that hotel, oh so many years ago.

_…rapist,_ she thinks, disgusted. She turns to the front of his file, tracking down his last noted living relatives. His mother was deceased long before he joined the Army and Kate knows that his father was dying a slow death, when Mark joined them on their road-trip.

A sharp breath escapes her when she discovers he has three surviving children listed on his record. Suzanne Hayes, born December 3rd of 1990; Pearl Victoria Lang, born November 18th of 1991; and Dustin Jacobs, born November 29th of 1993. In the back of her mind, Kate knows she recognises at least one of those last names, remembering how Mark talked about an Ariel Lang with the sort of derision that made her twitch in her seat. Andy had been oblivious to his attitude, barring how explicit he got about their sex-life; he’d gotten pompous and funny about it, saying that his little baby sister didn’t need to hear all that.

_I can’t believe I remember,_ Kate wonders fractiously, blinking away glassy eyes. The memory of Andy laughing uproariously in the living room, barely managing to tell anyone, let alone _Kate_, why he was doing so takes up so much space in her mind, then. Kate distinctly remembers him being hit on the backside with her grandfather’s cane, though who it was that did the deed slips her mind.

_Mark Friedman hung himself in bootcamp!_

In front of her, Gibbs passes her desk and Kate snaps the file shut, knowing she’s been caught. He slows abruptly, frowning.

“What are you doing, Agent Todd?”

Kate doesn’t know what to say. How is she supposed to say _anything?_ She watches as Gibbs’ lips thin and he reaches for the file, snatching it out from under her hands. A quiet fear sinks into her skin as he peruses Friedman’s record, glancing at photos and notes on his unusual death.

“Suicide,” he says after a minute or two. “Still hung up on your Catholic morals, Kate?”

“Somewhat,” she mutters, wincing as he continues.

“This is Army. _Not_ Navy,” he slaps the file down on her desk, leaning forwards to meet her down-trodden gaze. “Why did you get this?”

“I knew him. I didn’t like him.”

“No excuse, Agent. Get this back to- to wherever it belongs!” He snaps, angrily flipping the file onto her lap. Not expecting anything better, Kate grasps it tightly and shuts her light off, heading out of the bullpen to return it. She knows better than to go against Gibbs’ orders – and she doesn’t need it anymore, she hopes.

Gibbs glares at her as she goes.


	5. Toys

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "The Curse" - NCIS S01E05

There are many things Gibbs could be doing on a Thursday morning. Working, for one. Maybe working on his boat, if a day off is being foisted on him. However, he is not doing either of those things, because he is waiting for Kate to pick him up this morning, as his car is getting MOT’ed. When she finally pulls up in a nondescript vehicle, Gibbs automatically memorises her plates, then gets into the passenger seat.

“Coffee’s in the middle,” Kate tells him, sounding harried as she pulls away from the curb. Her driving is slow. That annoys Gibbs. The coffee more than makes up for it, until he discovers he’s picked up the wrong one – a rookie mistake, seeing as it has her raspberry lipgloss on the edge.

“You always in a rush, Todd?” he grunts as he finds his extra black java, hauling back about half of it. It’s cooled down between the coffee shop and his house enough for him to do so, though his tongue still asks him to desist.

“I am today,” she says in a terse manner, not exaggerating on the fact. Gibbs grunts again, waiting for a real answer and predictably, she caves, ranting immediately. “Children, Gibbs! My nieces and nephews are devil children, I _swear._ The stuff I got them came in duplicate from us other adults, because we can’t communicate properly unless it’s about how to avoid going to Thanksgiving as well as Christmas and now I have to get new ones sent across. The postage is _hell_.”

“How does that make you late?” Gibbs queries, not making the connection. Kate wordlessly motions to the back-seat, stewing. Gibbs looks in the backseat and does the mental maths, asking her, “How many nieces and nephews do you have?”

“Lots. Michael has eight different brats from three different women, though thankfully, five of them _are _from his wife,” explains Kate, fingers lifting as she names them. “Margo and Josh are from his old girlfriend from high school, twins; Daisy is a five year old from a sperm donation gone wrong, who came to live with my parents when she was two; and Joseph, Michael Junior, Fredrick – who we call Freddy – Annalise and Heidi are his wife’s kids.”

“There’s more presents in the backseat than eight,” Gibbs says starkly, counting an odd number, “unless you’re buying some double.”

“Oh, I’m not finished,” Kate says, turning off onto the highway. She drives well, but sedately, letting trucks pass and motorcyclists actually bother coming near her, unlike Gibbs when he’s on the road. “Michael’s the youngest of us, bar me. Rachel after him is the normal one. She only has two kids, Jennifer and Andrew the third – though my mom’s pushing her to have another three.”

“Your mom is crazy,” says Gibbs into his coffee, hearing Kate’s subsequent chuckle that doesn’t match her sharp, almost bitter reply.

“She wants me to be the next one to give her the _big news._ I think she’s competing with her friends from church – I know her best friend has fifteen grandchildren and then another two greats.”

“And the presents can’t be stuffed bears, because…”

Kate side-eyes him, like he’s said something idiotic. “Bears aren’t presents, Gibbs,” she tells him.

_News to me, _he thinks as Kate gets back to naming all her nieces and nephews.

“Danny – Daniel – is the next in line. He runs a store in town, so Mom’s not so hard on him. He only has three and a half: Lucy, Edmund and Peter. They’re hoping for a girl, so they can complete the set.”

“Huh?” Gibbs blinks, not getting the reference. Once again, Kate side-eyes him, though this one is more awkward than the last.

“Chronicles of Narnia, Gibbs. The Pevensie siblings – the kings and queens of Narnia?”

Gibbs shrugs, sipping his coffee.

Kate, clearly needing the pick-me-up, mutters _right_ before grabbing her own sugar and cream confection. There’s a short silence as they drink and think to themselves, before Gibbs asks her.

“So, why were you late? You can’t have bought all the presents for your nieces and nephews this morning.”

“Oh no, I was late because I have to wrap them and had to run back to grab the ones I’d forgotten,” his agent replies, before clarifying, “Abby agreed to help me out during our lunch-break, if we get one today.”

“We just got Erin Toner for murder and grand theft,” Gibbs snorts quietly, deciding to let it go. “If you manage to complete your paperwork early, you can do it in the bullpen, for all I care.”

“That won’t be necessary – I’m not doing any of it where Tony can see – but thank-you,” she says, sounding gracious.

“No problem,” Gibbs says, finishing his coffee. They turn off the freeway soon enough and he points out his normal coffee shop, needing a pick-me up. As they approach, he asks one last question. “Youngest of four, then, Todd?”

Kate smiles at him, though her eyes dim slightly, lacking that _sparkle._

“No,” she replies quietly, pulling up in front of his coffeehouse. “Andy is the eldest.”

Somehow still in a pleasant mood, Gibbs raises an amused eyebrow. “No house full of rampaging children, then?”

Kate unlocks the car doors, jerking her head. “Just one,” she says. “Your stop, boss.”

_Just one,_ Gibbs thinks, realising that her brother Michael is the absurdity. He nods appreciatively, taking his empty cup as he leaves her car, not glancing back a once as she pulls away. Mulling over all of Kate Todd’s answers, Gibbs realises one thing she left out in her impromptu roll-call of her family: her brother Andy’s kid’s name. It’s unusual, in comparison to the long list of nieces and nephews that she’s memorised.

Heading towards his coffeehouse, shaking the frankly useless conversation from his mind, Gibbs focuses on the day ahead and tries not to imagine Kate surrounded by children of her own. Spoiler alert: he absolutely, god damn it, _fails_, with the added bonus of inserting himself into her life as her fake, imaginary children’s father.

Gibbs sighs.

_A crush on a junior agent. Well done, Jethro. Well done._

When he finally arrives at work, Gibbs avoids Kate for the rest of the day and hopes he gets over this quickly.


	6. Hypnotise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "High Seas" - NCIS S01E06

Kate has always like rollercoasters. The yearly Harvest Fair in her home town had her favourite, a Halloween-style rollercoaster with orange bars and the type of speed that meant the seats had headrests keeping you jammed in place.

Going from zero to a hundred and forty knots in a second and a half reminds her of that rollercoaster.

“You look like you enjoyed that,” Gibbs grins at her as they deplane, taking off their white gear and handing it over to a nearby Marine. Kate, still smiling from their latest high-speed stop, nods, feeling childish and giddy. His grin widens and they walk off together, side by side.

“Have you ever been to a fun fair?” she asks him.

“Yeah,” he drawls. “Why? Get reminded of the good ol’ times, did you?”

“A bit,” Kate replies, floating on air. Bouncing on her heels, she asks him, “How many CAT launches have you been on?”

“Enough to know that _you_ are an adrenaline junkie, Caitlin Todd,” he ribs her, Tony – who has gone from ‘Dinozzo’ to ‘Tony’ at some point, somehow – piping up behind them with a quip of his own.

“Yeah, you’re a total freak, Katie. Who actually _likes_ wire landings and CAT launches?”

“Don’t call me Katie – and I like them, _Anthony._”

Tony shudders. “Don’t call me Anthony. I sound like my old man and trust me, you _don’t_ ever want to be compared to him.”

She hears Gibbs chuckle to himself on the way to the car. With Chief Reyes in custody, they can hand him over to the JAG to be charged and prosecuted, according to their report on the situation – so they head back to Navy Yard and settle in for another two hours, before being let off for the day.

On her way home, Kate thinks about that laugh. Gibbs is such a quiet person – though she thinks he would have laughed again, if he heard how she found her way into the men’s head instead of deck five berthing. It’s odd to Kate to find a quiet man, especially considering the loud home she’d grown up in. Even Andy, the calmest of her siblings, could raise hell when he wanted to.

She wonders whether he was always this quiet. If he read books as a kid or was taught by his parents to be seen and not heard – Kate’s mother was of the assumption that a quiet house meant misbehaving children, but she knows that her childhood buddies got in trouble for making too much noise. Was Gibbs a small town boy or a city kid? Did he grow up in a house or an apartment? Kate finds herself itching to know more about the man she calls her boss.

_Maybe I could ask him_, she jokes to herself, scoffing out loud as she unlocks her apartment door and muttering, “And maybe I’ll see a hypnotist to get over my fear of orthodontists.”

Her home is silent, except for the hum of her fridge-freezer. Kate turns on the hall light and makes her way to the kitchen, checking the dates on her leftovers and wrinkling her nose at everything. Sometimes, she really _hates_ how unreliable her work schedule can be, sending her off onto ships and – undoubtedly, at some point – foreign countries.

_But I like the work,_ she sighs to herself, closing her fridge and deciding to order in, tonight. The menu for her favourite Thai place is stuck to a cabinet with a thumbtack, but she hardly needs it for anything other than the number, calling in on her cell. Discovering the line is busy, Kate huffs and resolves to phone back in five minutes, surprised to hear the _buzz_ from her intercom.

With no idea who could be calling by, Kate heads to her door, pressing the speaker button. “Hello?”

“_Kate._”

“Gibbs – what are you doing here?” She asks, perplexed.

“_Need your opinion on something. Let me up._”

“Al-alright,” Kate murmurs, still confused as to why he’s here. Unlocking the complex activates the security camera, showing her Gibbs entering the front porch and closing the door behind him. A couple of seconds pass and she watches her boss call the elevator, before the camera shuts down, seven point five seconds up, now the gate is locked again.

He had to have followed after her, she reckons. It’s been less than five minutes since she got home. Luckily for Kate, that means she hasn’t gotten undressed yet, jacket hung up but her shoes still on. Anticipating his arrival, she goes to the door, standing in the open doorway with her Palm Pilot, going over her notes on the day’s case and wondering what he needs to talk to her about.

Eventually, the elevator dings down the hall and she looks up, catching sight of him with a coffee in hand. It’s a seemingly perpetual visual, him and coffee.

“What’s up?”

“Inside,” he gestures, crowding her as he passes by to get into her apartment. Kate quickly shuts the door behind him, following along quickly as he stalks through the interior of her home.

“Gibbs, not that it’s a bad thing, but why are you here?”

He enters the kitchen, glances around and then turns back, bumping into her. Nearly toppling over, Kate grabs the nearest thing to stop herself from falling: Gibbs. His sudden smirk is enough to make her take a step back, once she’s recovered her balance.

“I’m here to talk about you, Kate,” he says, before moving to enter her living room. Taken-aback, Kate doesn’t follow for a long moment. _Her?_ Why does he want to talk about _her?_ What has Kate done recently to get his attention like this? She’s never heard of anyone’s boss ever coming to their home like this.

_But this is Gibbs,_ her brain reminds her as she slowly turns, discovering that he’s sat down on her sofa and taken his jacket off to throw it over the back. Kate itches to move it, to hang it up – but she doesn’t, instead moving to sit beside him.

“What did I do?”

“Nothing,” he says.

She repeats, “Nothing.”

“_Nothing,_” states Gibbs, eyes locked on her. “This has nothing to do with work. I’m just trying to remember something and I need your opinion.”

“…okay,” Kate says, still worried. “What is it?”

“Las Vegas, summer of nineteen ninety-three.”

Immediately, Kate’s gut churns and she has to stop herself from blurting out a torrent of questions, like _how did you find out _and _why have you brought this up?_ A flush sweeps through her from head to toe and she struggles not to throw up.

“I recognised someone I knew, from back then,” Gibbs tells her. Kate stares, watching him sip his coffee and look around her living room, eyes drifting from the large canvas collage made by her niece, Heidi to her empty bookshelf, with only ten novels to its name. “Don’t know if it’s really them or not, but…”

“But what?” Kate finds herself asking. Her heart is thudding in her ears and a hazy recollection of familiar laughter echoes through her mind.

“How do you ask a woman that without offending her?” Gibbs clarifies.

“How do you ask a woman what?” Kate pushes, watching him twist to look her in the eyes.

“If you slept with them in Vegas ten years ago.”

She barely hears herself reply, lying and lying badly, at that. “I wasn’t in Vegas ten years ago, so I wouldn’t know.” Then she swallows, blinks back into reality and smiles, trying to hide the teeth in it. “You’d be better off asking Tony, sir. I’ve no idea. Just go for it.”

But her heart is still pounding in her chest and Gibbs has that _look_ on his face, the one that doesn’t believe what she’s saying. How _can_ you ask someone that question and expect them to tell the truth? Kate has so many regrets from that year – the whole of 1993 was a big, dark mark in the history of Caitlin Todd. The fact that Gibbs was in Vegas at the same time of year as her can be put off as coincidence.

She hopes it’s coincidence.

“I was going to order Thai food,” she says eventually, finally kicking off her shoes, grabbing them as she stands. This is her apartment. This is _her _domain. On the sofa, Gibbs looks small all of a sudden. “Do you want to join me?”

He’s quiet for a time and Kate goes to take that as a _no,_ before watching him stand up and nod, coming close as he passes her by.

“Menu in the kitchen?”

“…yeah,” she murmurs, smelling the scent of his cologne as he leaves her line of sight. “Pinned up. Tell me what you want and I’ll phone in a minute.”

“Sure,” she hears him say, before she escapes down the hall to put her shoes in her closet. Kate takes a moment to catch her breath, closing her eyes and massaging the bridge of her nose.

_It’s a coincidence,_ she convinces herself, _and he’s your boss. He wouldn’t have hired you, if you’d slept together ten years ago. It’s just a coincidence._

Her father’s favourite reply to those words echoes through her mind.

_There’s no such thing, Caitlin._


	7. Ornament

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Sub Rosa" - NCIS S01E07, part one

It was the way she smiled.

Her juvenile reaction to getting on and off the aircraft carrier made something click in his mind, a memory from years past coming back to life. Bare flesh, hands roaming over skin, lips on lips – a _damn_ good evening, spent with a young strip of nothing with dark hair and a familiar smile in Vegas, ‘93. He’d gotten them a hotel room and when he woke at dawn, Gibbs had snuck off with the mother of all hangovers, regretting everything he’d done the night before. If he hadn’t known for sure that she was legal, he would have handed himself over to the Feds in an instant.

Most of his memories of that weekend are fuzzy, if not outright obliterated – but Gibbs remembers with clarity that smile. The fact that it belongs to Kate shocks him. Never, _ever_ before then, had he ever thought they’d met previously. Yeah, he’s wondered what she looks like underneath her clothes, maybe had a daydream or two what it’d be like to love her the way he’d loved Shannon – but it would have been an impossible thought to think that he already knows the former.

He goes over to her apartment because he has to know, treading carefully and trying not to react when she lies to his face about being in Vegas that year. How could either of them have known? She clearly doesn’t – the idea terrifies her. Every micro-expression on her face blares _what if_, touched with a genuine fright that makes him recoil and wonder if he traumatised her – if she was blackout drunk and didn’t know whose hotel room she woke up in, if she’s connecting him to a blank-faced dick who fucked her and left.

Gibbs never should have asked – and he never will again.

However, then comes their time on the _Philadelphia_, a Los Angeles Class nuclear submarine with an imposter on board. Oh, how his blood _boils_ when Captain Veitch calls his agent _an inconvenience._ It’s not because she’s Kate, not because they slept together ten years ago – but that certainly doesn’t help him keep a lid on his anger. Kate gives him hell for the all of five minutes he spends inside intimidating the whacko and Gibbs can’t even be mad at her, because this is exactly the kind of bullshit that she sees all the damn time.

Kate is a good agent. She is not some- some _ornament_ or just a pretty face he can slap a _gender diversity_ sticker onto when HR asks him why all his employees are men. She does her job and she does it well. There is no _‘so what if she’_ or _‘except for when’_. She’s a good agent and she’s his agent – and that’s the end of it.

Until the Emergency Blow.

Gravity turns, he stumbles back into a wall and then Kate stumbles into him. Their bodies are pressed together, his hand on her back and the coat of arms, with hers against his chest. Gibbs has to look away from her, feeling a rush of blood down south; he tries to think cringe-worthy thoughts, like Ducky streaking or seeing his mother without her towel on when he was ten.

It doesn’t exactly work – and he can see from the pink dusting Kate’s cheek that she feels it as well, even as he tries to keep his professional veneer.

“What’s happening?” she asks.

“Emergency Blow,” he replies, before the COB – and damn it, this is _not _the kind of compromising position Kate should be caught in when women aren’t even supposed to be on subs – tells him the Skipper wants him. He calls, “Hang on a moment!” Then they’re like that, pressed up against a wall for a dozen seconds and all Gibbs wants to do in that moment is kiss her.

He shuts his eyes and forces himself to think of Ducky naked.

When the sub levels out, Kate is still pressed against him. Gibbs lets the thought of Ducky float away on the wind, focusing on his agent – on Kate, whose palms are firm against his shirt as she gets her balance back.

“Wow.”

“Yeah, that’s what they all tell me,” he mutters, not flirting in the slightest. He honestly can’t help the tiny smirk as Kate narrows her eyes, but it’s the thoughtful frown tinged with worry that makes it fade. “Kate?”

For a moment, she’s silent. Then, she utters those damning words: “Did we ever meet before you found me on Air Force One?”

_Crap,_ Gibbs thinks, staring at her with a wide-eyed, stunned expression. Kate steps away from him, looking slightly lost and Gibbs- Gibbs turns his focus on the case. On _why_ there was an Emergency Blow in the first place. He pushes away his memory of a younger Kate – _of a twenty year old,_ his mind calculates, damningly, _who never should have been that drunk in the first place, you lecherous fucking bastard_ – and acts like she didn’t say a word, that she hit him with two hands and stepped back and said nada_._

They find the imposter, who is dead as a doornail by the time they get to him and then there’s coffee – blissfully hot coffee, accompanied by a silence only interrupted by the tap of Kate’s pen.

“You’ve always drunk coffee,” Gibbs hears her say when he’s not facing her. He stops, grip on his mug increasing. He’s only drunk one mouthful, but he’s thinking of other things – the case, for one. _Clearly, she remembers more than you do,_ he thinks scornfully, pacing back and forth until she asks, “How can you drink coffee when it’s a hundred degrees?”

“It helps me think,” he says, on autopilot, except for the single moment where he sees her tugging at her collar, bare skin and bra strap on show. In the fluorescent lighting, he can even see an outline of the rest of it – but Gibbs can’t think about that, not now, _not when they’re on a case._

Not when they’re on a case.


	8. Fine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Sub Rosa" - NCIS S01E07, part two

Except, they aren’t on their case forever.

They don’t share a bunk, later, after they’ve booted a time bomb of a corpse out through torpedo tube _numero uno_ – but that doesn’t stop Gibbs from taking a visit. He knocks on her door and calls her name, waiting a moment before hearing her faint call of _come in, Gibbs._

Sat at the desk, Kate has already turned to watch him enter. Gibbs claps his hands together, lacking something to fidget with as he closes the door. They aren’t on a case.

“We need to talk.”

Her face shutters and mutely, she nods, gesturing to her bunk. Gibbs goes over, sitting down on the familiar pallet mattress and not looking her way as he says.

“Vegas. Ninety-three.”

“It wasn’t a great year for me.”

“Me neither,” Gibbs agrees, chancing a look. Without her jumper, she’s just in that white button-up, her laptop open and blinking away on a digital report sheet. Kate hasn’t filled out a single box. He stretches out his back, admitting, “I got divorced that year. My buddies took me out there to get drunk and…well…”

“_Debauched,_” she fills in for him, hand gripping the edge of her desk tightly. Her mouth moves, but no sound comes out. Gibbs watches her get her words in order before she speaks, taking a deep breath and sitting up straighter. “If we’re sharing horror stories of nineteen ninety-three, then it might be prudent for you to know that one of my brother’s former friends assaulted me. I went to Vegas in attempt to get over my fear of guys. It worked really well.”

“Wait, _what?_” Gibbs exclaims, eyes wide. Kate looks to her nails, her hand shaking. Gibbs stands up, moving over to where she’s sat – it’s not very far, but it’s enough to get her to look at him. “Kate,” he says, unable to believe what he just heard.

She smiles that damn fake smile of hers. “Things like this happen all the time, Gibbs. It was ten years ago. I’m fine.”

“It shouldn’t have happened,” he says, quaking in his own boots. _I’m going to kill whoever did it,_ Gibbs thinks, fists balling up tight.

“No,” she replies calmly, “it shouldn’t have. But it did and while I won’t forget, I’ve laid it to rest – just like his buddies did to him in bootcamp.”

_Bootcamp._ Gibbs frowns. “What?”

A chuckle escapes her and she smiles freely this time, “He’s dead, Gibbs and I’m pretty sure it was murder. I wouldn’t go looking for answers. They ruled it a suicide, gave him a dishonourable discharge and gave my brother something to laugh about.”

Her hand reaches up to cover his, squeezing it lightly. “I’m fine, Gibbs,” she says in a quiet voice, a wicked sort of smile tugging at her lips. “I promise. Nothing came of it except me, you and a hotel room in Vegas.”

Gibbs snorts and he takes her hand in his own, squeezing back. “You and me, huh? Maybe you’re one of the ones who said _wow_.”

She does actually hit him at that, but she’s grinning and he’s grinning back, despite the private information she just shared with him. His heart feels an air balloon, rising miles higher in the sky at the sight of that smile, her eyes glittering with genuine happiness. Gibbs is _really_ losing the battle against this crush and frankly, at this point he’s tempted to let it loose, forget the damage it might cause. Standing and sitting there together, it’s only when Kate speaks that there’s more than silence.

“This won’t change anything, will it? Us working together, I mean.”

“No,” Gibbs promises, tilting his eyebrow at the last minute. “Doesn’t mean there can’t be a repeat of events, occasionally.”

“Occasionally?” She copies his movement, so pristine and perfect. _Fine,_ she’d said – hell yeah, she’s fine. Finer than all his ex-wives, with a hell of a lot better attitude towards his work.

Grinning at her, Gibbs leans down to whisper in her ear, lowly. “Any time, Kate. From what I remember, you’re one hell of a woman.”

“You bet on it,” she murmurs in reply, before her hand touches his cheek and redirects his face. Their lips collide in a smash and Gibbs wastes no time before hauling her up and out of her seat to press against his body. Another chuckle escapes her and he makes to smother it, tongue swirling through her mouth.

They part, briefly. “Just to be sure,” she gasps, “we’re not _actually_ having sex, are we? Because I have no intention of making this room smell like a brothel.”

“Sure, we’re not,” Gibbs shrugs, happy with what he can get – not that he was expecting much, the same sort of thing running through his mind. “Can I get back to kissing you, now?”

“Gladly, Gibbs. Get to it.”

Happy, he dives right back in.


	9. Hate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Minimum Security" - NCIS S01E08

As tempting as the prospect might be, she does not seek Gibbs out for anything in Gitmo. So, maybe she might flash a little skin – not that she means to show Tony her legs in the morning, when he gets freaked out over a lizard, of all things – and have some X-rated thoughts about the double bed and the bathtub that Gibbs is hoarding, but she genuinely does not come onto him in Cuba.

Part of that may or may not come from his ‘romance between agents never works’ schtick. Kate doesn’t even think to hide her reaction to _that,_ hurt rolling off her in waves. The fact that he looks so sorry is a non sequitur.

“Kind of hot and cold, Gibbs,” she says to him in a free moment. He glances her way, then returns to his paperwork – and that is that, apparently. The fact that they’ve been fucking for a month means…nothing.

Alright then.

Kate recruits Michael to her cause some time after they touch down. What’s a little harmless revenge, considering what he said? He gets Annalise in on the plan, her niece _quite_ the actor, in Kate’s opinion. They bide their time, her niece practicing her spiel on the phone to her, until she’s got it down right to pat.

Then, she phones ahead in the car, when Gibbs is following her home.

When Kate opens her apartment door, he’s courteous enough to remove her coat, hand trailing down her side. She tilts her head to the side when he kisses her neck, almost wishing that she hadn’t decided on revenge as her modus operandi.

_I should have just talked to him, instead…_and there goes her landline.

Gibbs pauses, muttering, “Who’d be calling you at this hour?”

“Don’t know,” Kate breathes, detaching herself from him and speed-walking to the kitchen. She picks up the receiver, bringing it to her ear. “Todd.”

“_Hi, Aunty Kate!_”

A smile blooms on her face at her niece’s voice. “Hey, Ann,” she puts a second hand to the phone, hearing Gibbs’ footsteps at her back where he’s stopped in the doorway. “Why’re you calling?”

“_Wanted to speak to you, because you’re my favourite,_” Annalise says promptly, reciting her lines perfectly. “_Are you busy? Do you have someone over?_”

“I do,” Kate cranes her neck to look at him, raising an eyebrow as he unbuttons his shirt, tugging it teasingly. “He’s waiting.”

“_Is he your boyfriend?_”

“You’d have to ask him that yourself,” she replies, almost too wryly. Annalise snorts to herself, the piggish noise loud and genuine.

“_Can I?_” she questions.

“I’ll ask,” Kate says, pressing the phone to her chest and turning around. “It’s my niece, Annalise. One of my brother, Michael’s kids.”

“That the one with the surplus?” Gibbs questions, stepping forwards. He glances down at the phone in amusement as Annalise’s repeated _Aunty Kate, Aunty Kate, Aunty Kate_ gets a little louder. Par for the course for any conversation with her, Kate ignores it as she shrugs.

“She wants to speak to you.”

“Me?” Gibbs raises an eyebrow. “How old is she?”

“Eight,” Kate replies, finger ready on the button to turn the phone on speaker. “Do you mind?”

“Go for it.”

Feeling triumphant – and dearly wanting to see Gibbs’ reaction to being asked if Kate is his girlfriend – Kate turns the speaker on, keeping her pleasant mask up. He should have no reason to suspect.

“_-Aunty Kate, Aunty Kate, Aunty Kate-_”

“Hi,” Gibbs says, butting in on her repetitions.

There’s a pause before Annalise replies enthusiastically, “_Hi! Who are you?_”

“Gibbs. Who are you?”

“_Annalise Elizabeth,_” Annalise recites, before asking, “_Are you my aunty’s boyfriend?_”

Kate watches Gibbs’ expression shift, thoughtfulness mixing with apprehension. Then, _of course_, like a good partner in any field, Gibbs looks at her, nonverbal, using his eyebrows and his gaze to pose the question: _what do I say?_

Kate bites her lip. What should he say? She hated how he talked in Cuba – and what he says now could be her gateway into calling him a hypocrite, should the need arise. In her mind, Kate quietly hopes she never has to – but this is Gibbs. She should have her arguments ready.

Silently, she tries to tell him: _it’s your choice._ Luckily, Gibbs is savvy and gets the message. He nods shortly, clearing his throat to speak to Annalise, even as Kate holds her breath in wait.

“Something like that,” he says in a professional tone, before asking Annalise, “What do you think about that?”

_That never came up on our list of potential questions._ Kate thinks blankly, wondering how her niece is taking it – how Michael is taking it, if he’s listening on the other end. Are they having their own frantic and silent conversation right now, arms waving madly? They came up for contingencies if Gibbs got suspicious, for if he got defensive or wasn’t answering. They didn’t come up with a plan for if he made _conversation._

To be fair, Gibbs doesn’t usually do small chat.

The phone crackles with Annalise’s breath as she replies, voice slow. “_I suppose…I suppose it’s nice. You could come around for Christmas with Aunty Kate and she’d have someone to stand with in the group photo. Daddy says she should stand with David, but I don’t know why._”

“Who’s David?” Gibbs asks, before Kate abruptly turns off the speaker, clapping the phone to her ear.

“Annalise Todd, what has your daddy been saying to you about David?” She demands, heart racing. She barely registers Gibbs at her front, the hands settled at her waist keeping her in place; it’s what she needs right now, though she doesn’t acknowledge it.

Annalise hums in that frightened way. “_Am I in trouble? Daddy said we’re not allowed to mention him to you._”

She feels like she’s about to be sick. “No. You- you can mention him all you like, just…just don’t ask him why he doesn’t stand with me in pictures. He doesn’t know, like you.”

“_Oh,_” Annalise mumbles. “_Can your boyfriend still hear us? Gibbs is a funny name for a boy._”

Kate closes her eyes, regretting this stupid plan and hating her brother for telling his kids that David is connected to her without her permission. She can imagine it being some stupid off-comment that he forgot he ever made after telling them not to say anything to her, but that’s not like him – and he knows his kids are gossips. Michael is a crappy brother and clearly, he told Annalise, at least, on purpose.

“I like his name,” Kate admits, head dipping to rest against Gibbs’ chest. “And no, Gibbs can’t hear us. I’m not really liking this conversation anymore, Ann.”

“_Sorry, Aunty Kate. I didn’t mean to upset you._”

“You didn’t upset me, Ann,” says Kate, lying through her teeth. “Stuff about me and David is private. If you hear anyone talking about him and me, you tell them that Aunty Kate will shoot them all the way from DC if they don’t shut their traps.”

“_I will! Promise!_”

“Thank-you, honey.” Kate sighs, opening her eyes. “I’m going to hang up, now.”

“_Okay – bye, Aunty Kate! BYE GIBBS!_”

Kate winces at the volume, Gibbs raising his voice slightly to say, “Bye, Annalise.”

“Bye,” Kate finishes, hanging up. Immediately after putting the phone down, she puts her hands to her face, trying to hide the shame that is surely shown on her face. _That plan went sideways – and next time I’m home, I’m going to strangle my brother._

She feels Gibbs let her hips free, fingers delicately prying her hands from her face. Kate is embarrassed to feel tears in her eyes, old hurts brought to light in front of him making it worse.

“Kate,” he mumbles, asking, “Who’s David?”

“Andy’s nephew.”

“And?” His voice is as delicate as his touch, patient and soothing. The low timbre of his voice calms her, even in the face of what could turn out to be a more awkward talk than that of ‘are we together’ conversation they’ve not even really had.

“And Michael’s nephew,” Kate says, practically croaking. Some of that patience leaves him and he hits her with a Look that has her withering in shame. “He…he’s my son. David Andrew Todd.”

“That’s not on your file.”

“It wouldn’t be – my mom made me give him up. Andy managed to get her to let him keep him as a pretend foster-kid. David still calls him Uncle Andy and all of my siblings aunt and uncle, too.”

Gibbs raises his hand to her arm, comforting her when he really, really should be asking the hard questions. Kate knows it’s only a matter of time and part of her wants to get it out now, before it’s too late.

“He doesn’t know about you,” he says, gathering evidence from her previous conversation with Annalise. “He has no idea.”

“No, he doesn’t,” Kate replies, heartsore. She wipes at her eyes, sniffing once. _Be brave._ “My mom is a devout Catholic. She wasn’t happy to learn I got pregnant without being married. _Really_ not happy.”

“How old were you?”

“That is the question, isn’t it?” Kate says, almost to herself. She sees his expression flicker. A few beats of silence, then she says it: “Twenty. Twenty-one by the time I had him. As I said, ninety-three was a bad year for me. Ninety-four was only a little worse. At least I got to see him, sometimes.”

“Twenty,” he mutters, rubbing at her arm. She watches his expression turn thunderous, expecting to be subject to a tirade or some form of abuse – but he presses their foreheads together, grasping at her hands almost too tightly. “Correct me if I’m wrong.”

“I won’t.”

A tight smile flashes across his face, Kate glued to every micro-expression he emits. He’s upset. Happy. Angry – very angry. But his eyes are glassy.

“You think he could be…you…” Gibbs’ voice dies away.

_Oh, Gibbs,_ she thinks, finally taking control. She lets go of his hands, holding his face. Before she speaks, Kate presses their lips together and it’s- it’s sweet. Gentle. Kate can almost forget what she’s about to tell him.

They both cry when she does.


	10. Productive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Marine Down" - NCIS S01E09

He winces when she hits his arm.

“We’re not at work anymore, so I can shout at you for taking a bullet for me.”

“Ow?” Gibbs says, finding zero pity in Kate’s eyes. Frankly, she looks murderous and Gibbs can only say, “It was a graze.”

She scoffs.

Since the revelation about David, their dynamic has shifted. Kate has settled in better with Tony as her work partner and heeds Gibbs’ advice to the letter in NCIS. Similarly, he’s noticed her friendship with Abby soaring and her tendency to drop by to see Ducky at lunch increase. Gibbs, who lives on coffee, take-out and most recently, the knowledge that he has a romantic partner who also has their shared child waiting in the wings, likewise is enjoying the benefits.

Those said benefits do _not_ include peace and quiet when he gets shot, apparently.

Kate kisses him shortly, but pokes him again as she hisses, “I do not like it when you get hurt. I’m the younger one – I have a better recovery rate than you.”

“You really going to bring age into this, Kate?” Gibbs challenges, not surprised when she tilts her chin in defiance. “Age over beauty. _Experience_ also comes with age.”

“I’d say with age comes ego, but I suppose you wouldn’t know anything about that,” she taunts, hands running up his front. Gibbs half-hides his grin, swinging her up against one of the soft, wooden struts of his boat to brush his lips against her neck – hissing in pain when she deliberately passes her hand up his arm.

“_Ow._”

“Serves you right.”

“Serves me right,” he mutters, scowling. “I don’t want to see you get shot either, Kate!”

Her scowl matches his, as does her ferocity when they kiss under the spotlight in his basement. Gibbs doesn’t even get upset this time when he hauls her up to leave – usually, he’d put up a fuss about not having sex in the basement, but right now he doesn’t want to hear another word out of her that isn’t his name.

“You’re not being productive enough,” says Kate as he carries her to the couch, splaying her out in front of him. Gibbs glowers.

“I was _trying_ not to fall over my own two feet getting up those stairs. You want to try lifting me, next time?”

Her eyes roam over him as he strips, glittering possessively. “I think I’ll pass.”

“Damn right, you’ll pass.” Gibbs returns, lips seeking skin, clawing at her cotton panties and grinning when she hollers his name, his tongue finding the pink flesh he’s seeking. She moans his name.

“Gibbs!”

_Not being productive, my ass._


	11. Faithful

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Left For Dead" - NCIS S01E10

Her stiches are clean, but she really needs a shower. Dust from the explosion has gotten in her hair and stained her face – her clothes are a lost cause, which is the main reason why she came back to her own apartment. She’s grateful rather than anticipatory when she discovers that Gibbs has followed her home.

“Can you help me?” she mumbles.

“Yeah, Kate,” he replies. It’s Gibbs that strips off her clothes, Gibbs who runs the water till it’s warm – Gibbs who stands with her in her bath and scrubs her down, gentle and silent, all the way through.

Eventually, he says to her, “It wasn’t your fault. You couldn’t have known and I don’t blame you for missing it. Amnesiacs are tricky.”

“She certainly tricked me,” Kate replies, mouth full of molasses. Her head drops to his shoulder and she cries, his arms wrapping around her, lips pressed to her hair.

The water runs till it freezes and Gibbs is there with her – an ever-faithful companion in her regret.


End file.
